Heli Pilot (BTD6)

BTD5

BTD6

BTDB2

Heli Pilot
General Information
Game	Bloons TD 6 (v1.0)
Release Date	June 13th 2018
Class	Military Monkey
Unlocked at	Level 7-12
Cost	Default: $1,360 (Easy) $1,600 (Medium) $1,730 (Hard) $1,920 (Impoppable) Advanced Logistics: $1,290 (Easy) $1,520 (Medium) $1,640 (Hard) $1,825 (Impoppable) Military Conscription: $910 (Easy) $1,070 (Medium) $1,160 (Hard) $1,285 (Impoppable) Both: $845 (Easy) $990 (Medium) $1,070 (Hard) $1,190 (Impoppable)
Activated Ability(s)	Support Chinook (Crate Ability, Reposition Ability) Special Poperations (Marine Ability)
Targeting Options	Follow Touch/Mouse, Lock in Place, Patrol Points, Pursuit with upgrade
Hotkey	B
Other Names	Heli
Statistics
Damage	1 (per dart, spray of 2)
Pierce	3 (per dart, spray of 2)
Attack Speed	0.57s
Range	22 (dummy range) 42 (from helicopter) Heli location depends on position
Status Effects	Requires upgrades
Tower Boosts	N/A
Income/Life Boosts	Requires upgrades
Camo Detection	Yes (x-2-x)
Footprint	Very Large (27)
Default Damage Type	Sharp
Related Towers
Heli Pilot (BTD5), for the BTD5 counterpart Heli Pilot (BTDB2), for the BTDB2 counterpart

“	Hovers wherever you direct it. Shoots from twin heavy dart guns.	”
	~ In-game Description

Heli Pilot is a Military-class tower in Bloons TD 6. The tower retains its name and role from the Bloons TD 5 Generation, with significant additions. It did not receive any teasers prior to release, but it was first shown when the game was available to select YouTubers several days before BTD6's official release date.

The Heli Pilot controls a helicopter that can fly at a speed of 40 units per second. As a flying tower with mobility, it can move towards any position whenever needed, and has additional targeting priorities that set it to patrol between two points or lock in a specific location. The helicopter shoots a twin straight spray of darts every 0.57s that pierce 3 bloons per dart. While the helicopter has infinite flight range, its dart attack has a range of 42 relative to the helicopter.

Despite its expensive cost, the tower is capable of dishing out lots of damage and providing support where it's needed. It is one of the two towers that can be controlled via the player's mouse/touch, the other being Dartling Gunner. It is also known as the tower with most special abilities in a single upgrade.

It costs $1,360 on Easy, $1,600 on Medium, $1,730 on Hard, and $1,920 on Impoppable by default.

Description

The Heli Pilot returns in Bloons TD 6, filling in its same role as a mobile tower. It still has its original targeting options, with Pursuit still being unlocked via upgrade.

Path 1 focuses around DPS and offense. Starting off with Quad Darts is an improvement to the quantity of darts shot at once, and followed by the Pursuit upgrade which is all about aggressively moving towards targets. Starting with Razor Rotors, new weaponry is added to the Heli Pilot; its razor sharp rotors are able to pop bloons (including Lead or Frozen) on contact. Apache Dartship extends its arsenal to homing missiles and powerful machine gun with final upgrade Apache Prime increasing the strength of all its weapons massively.

Path 2 focuses on support. Starting with Bigger Jets that allows it to move faster, then IFR, which gives it camo detection, as well as the first two upgrades improve MOAB Shove followed by Downdraft, which pushes back any non-MOAB bloons on contact. Support Chinook gives the tower two abilities, being a crate ability, which gives either bonus lives or bonus cashes followed by the final upgrade Special Poperations allowing the tower to deploy a powerful Marine temporarily.

Path 3 focuses on defense. The first two upgrades start increasing the dart's projectile speed and distance, followed by attack speed of all attacks. The first major change to the Heli Pilot as a defensive measure is the MOAB Shove, which reverses or slow movement of MOAB-class bloons. Comanche Defense summons three Mini-Comanches once bloons reach a certain percentage of the bloon track, followed by the final upgrade Comanche Commander, which increases all of its weapons as well as having permanent mini-Comanches.

Target Priorities

The Heli Pilot's target priority is mainly based on its flight pattern. Unlike the Monkey Ace, the Heli Pilot can move anywhere based on user interaction. By default, its set target priority is Follow Touch (or Follow Mouse on desktop versions). It comes with three target priorities by default: Follow Touch/Mouse, Lock In Place, and Patrol. If target option is changed partway through the Heli Pilot's flight, the Heli will attempt to fly promptly from its old target priority to its new target priority.

The following are a list of target priorities that a Heli Pilot can use:

• Follow Touch / Follow Mouse: Moves to where the player taps. On desktop versions, Follow Touch instead becomes Follow Mouse, which will make the Heli Pilot move to wherever the cursor is currently at.
• Lock In Place: Stops the Heli Pilot where it is when the Target Priority is selected. Can be adjusted to choose a different locked location.
• Patrol: Patrols between two spots chosen by the player. Can be adjusted to choose different points.
• Pursuit: Equivalent to the target priority First, except the Heli Pilot will follow in front of the bloons while shooting them. It is unlocked with the purchase of the second upgrade on the first path, with the same name as the target priority. Once upgraded to the respective upgrade, it automatically switches to this target priority.

The Heli Pilot's main attacks always locked on First based on the range of the helicopter's weaponry. Alternate attacks tend to have different target priorities:

• Rockets from Apache Dartship and Apache Prime, as well as missiles from MOAB Shove always target First and have extended range.
• Rotor attacks from Razor Rotors and Downdraft are locked on Close.
• MOAB Shove's shove effect is locked on Close.
• Mini-Comanches from Comanche Defense and Comanche Commander both follow flight pattern of the main helicopters.

Upgrades

Path 1

	Quad Darts COST: $680 / $800 / $865 / $960 UNLOCK: 200 XP
	Description: Shoots 4 darts per volley instead of 2. Effect: Self-explanatory

	Pursuit COST: $425 / $500 / $540 / $600 UNLOCK: 650 XP
	Description: A new targeting option enables Heli to seek and pursue the Bloons automatically. Effect: Gains new Pursuit flight priority which automatically moves heli in front of the bloon closest to the exit.

	Razor Rotors COST: $1,485 / $1,750 / $1,890 / $2,100 UNLOCK: 2,700 XP
	Description: Razor Rotor blades rip up Bloons on contact, including Lead and Frozen Bloons. Effect: Bloons within close range of the Heli Pilot become damaged, including Frozen and Leads. Pops up to 10 bloons and deals 2 damage every 0.45s.

	Apache Dartship COST: $16,660 / $19,600 / $21,170 / $23,520 UNLOCK: 20,000 XP
	Description: Adds a large missile array and powerful machine guns. Effect: Gains a dart-shooting machine gun attack alongside quad homing missiles that deal 2 damage per missile. Also improves rotors to double its pierce and damage.

	Apache Prime COST: $38,250 / $45,000 / $48,600 / $54,000 UNLOCK: 55,000 XP
	Description: The Apache Prime leaves most Bloons wishing they'd never been inflated. Effect: Quad dart replaced with lasers, dealing 6 damage and having greatly increased pierce. Machine gun replaced with plasma dealing 5 damage, and more pierce, and missiles deal 17 damage to MOAB class Bloons instead of 2. Further improves rotors to double its pierce and damage.

Path 2

	Bigger Jets COST: $255 / $300 / $325 / $360 UNLOCK: 150 XP
	Description: Powerful jets make Heli move much faster. Effect: Heli Pilot moves +75% faster. With MOAB Shove, improves MOAB Shove effect.

	IFR COST: $510 / $600 / $650 / $720 UNLOCK: 650 XP
	Description: Allows Heli Pilot to detect and shoot Camo Bloons. Effect: Allows the Heli to detect and attack Camo Bloons.

	Downdraft COST: $2,975 / $3,500 / $3,780 / $4,200 UNLOCK: 3,300 XP
	Description: Blows Bloons away from the Heli, back toward the entrance. Effect: Periodically blows back 2 bloons or 1 Ceramic at a time at a rate of 4.44 blowbacks per second. Can blowback even faster with Faster Firing.

Support Chinook COST: $8,075 / $9,500 / $10,260 / $11,400 UNLOCK: 15,000 XP

Description: Blows back many more Bloon and gains abilities: Drops lives and cash crates, or can pick up and redeploy most Monkey types. Effect: Gains two abilities, a crate ability and a redeployment ability. Crates give bonus lives and bonus cash. Can redeploy all "non-heavy" types of tower. Blowback rate improved from 4.44 blowbacks per second to 6.67 blowbacks per second, and blowback pierce increased to 4 from 2. Chinook darts also are larger and deal 2 damage.

	Special Poperations COST: $25,500 / $30,000 / $32,400 / $36,000 UNLOCK: 40,000 XP
	Description: Deploys a powerful special Monkey Marine with machine gun. Effect: Increases Heli movement speed by 50%, greatly improves crate ability, and gains an ability that deploys a Marine. The Marine uses a powerful machine gun that deals 6 damage and pops up to 20 bloons per dart, pops any bloon type, and comes with camo detection. The Marine shoots faster with the Faster Firing upgrade.

Path 3

	Faster Darts COST: $210 / $250 / $270 / $300 UNLOCK: 140 XP
	Description: Darts are propelled much faster through the air. Effect: Improves projectile speed of main dart attack. Increases attack distance of dart attacks by +30%.

	Faster Firing COST: $295 / $350 / $380 / $420 UNLOCK: 550 XP
	Description: Faster attack speed for all Heli attacks. Effect: Attacks +25% faster (0.80x attack cooldown).

	MOAB Shove COST: $2,550 / $3,000 / $3,240 / $3,600 UNLOCK: 2,500 XP
	Description: Can collide with and shove MOAB-Class Bloons, reversing or slowing their movement. Shove is amplified by Bigger Jets and IFR upgrades. Effect: Shoves back against MOAB-class bloons close to it, pushing them backwards or slowing down their movement. Improves shove effect with the Bigger Jets upgrade. Also adds a slow firing missile attack.

	Comanche Defense COST: $7,225 / $8,500 / $9,180 / $10,200 UNLOCK: 12,500 XP
	Description: Automatically calls in mini Comanches when they're most needed. Effect: Mini-Comanches can be summoned once bloons reach a certain percentage of the bloon track, one more for every 25% of the bloon track surpassed, capped at 3. Mini-Comanches shoot enhanced darts and missiles and automatically fly in the same flight pattern as main Heli. Main heli attacks are also improved.

	Comanche Commander COST: $27,200 / $32,000 / $34,560 / $38,400 UNLOCK: 50,000 XP
	Description: Upgraded weapons. Also automatically calls in 3 more Comanches. Permanently. Effect: Darts from both main and mini-Comanches deal more damage, missiles deal increased damage with further bonuses against MOAB-Class Bloons and Ceramics, and the 3 mini-Comanches are now permanent.

Total Costs

Easy:

		Tier 1	Tier 2	Tier 3	Tier 4	Tier 5
Path 1
	Base Cost	680	425	1,485	16,660	38,250
	Cumulative Cost	2,040	2,465	3,950	20,610	58,860
	Base Sell	476	297.5	1,039.5	11,662	26,775
	Cumulative Sell	1,428	1,726	2,765	14,427	41,202
Path 2
	Base Cost	255	510	2,975	8,925	25,500
	Cumulative Cost	1,615	2,125	5,100	14,025	39,225
	Base Sell	178.5	357	2,082.5	6,247.5	17,850
	Cumulative Sell	1,131	1,488	3,570	9,818	27,668
Path 3
	Base Cost	210	295	2,550	7,225	29,750
	Cumulative Cost	1,570	1,865	4,415	11,640	41,390
	Base Sell	147	206.5	1,785	5,057.5	20,825
	Cumulative Sell	1,099	1,306	3,091	8,148	28,973

Medium:

		Tier 1	Tier 2	Tier 3	Tier 4	Tier 5
Path 1
	Base Cost	400	500	1,750	19,600	45,000
	Cumulative Cost	2,000	2,500	4,250	23,850	68,850
	Base Sell	280	350	1,225	13,720	31,500
	Cumulative Sell	1,400	1,750	2,975	16,695	48,195
Path 2
	Base Cost	300	600	3,500	10,500	30,000
	Cumulative Cost	1,900	2,500	6,000	16,500	46,500
	Base Sell	210	420	2,450	7,350	21,000
	Cumulative Sell	1,330	1,750	4,200	11,550	32,550
Path 3
	Base Cost	250	350	3,000	8,500	35,000
	Cumulative Cost	1,850	2,200	5,200	13,700	48,700
	Base Sell	175	245	2,100	5,950	24,500
	Cumulative Sell	1,295	1,540	3,640	9,590	34,090

Hard:

		Tier 1	Tier 2	Tier 3	Tier 4	Tier 5
Path 1
	Base Cost	430	540	1,890	21,170	48,600
	Cumulative Cost	2,160	2,700	4,590	25,760	74,360
	Base Sell	301	378	1,323	14,819	34,020
	Cumulative Sell	1,512	1,890	3,213	18,032	52,052
Path 2
	Base Cost
	Cumulative Cost
	Base Sell
	Cumulative Sell
Path 3
	Base Cost
	Cumulative Cost
	Base Sell
	Cumulative Sell

Impoppable:

		Tier 1	Tier 2	Tier 3	Tier 4	Tier 5
Path 1
	Base Cost	960	600	2,100	23,520	54,000
	Cumulative Cost	2,785	3,385	5,485	29,005	83,005
	Base Sell
	Cumulative Sell
Path 2
	Base Cost	360	720	4,200
	Cumulative Cost	2,185	2,905	7,105
	Base Sell
	Cumulative Sell
Path 3
	Base Cost	300	420	3,600	10,200	38,400
	Cumulative Cost	2,125	2,545	6,145	16,345
	Base Sell
	Cumulative Sell

Strategy

See also: Heli Pilot (BTD6)/Strategies

Summary

Heli Pilot has an advantage on maps that have many obstacles and/or have multiple nearby paths, making use of its mobility to hover towards its targets. It can be manually controlled towards a pointer or at fixed point(s), adding user-driven control to the Heli Pilot. It has rather expensive upgrades that mostly lean towards utility and situational damage.

Tips

• Placement of the pad shouldn't matter much, but try to squeeze it along edges to save space, and it is ideal to place them close to the range of Villages to gain their benefits.

Additional Strategies

• Crosspathing/Heli Pilot

Monkey Knowledge

This section displays Monkey Knowledge that has effects on Heli Pilot and its changes when compared to one by default:

• Airforce Upgrades: All T3+ Heli Pilots get +1 pierce.
  • Base pierce increased from 3 → 4.
• Elite Military Training: All Military Monkeys get a one-off +1000 XP and earn XP in-game 5% faster permanently.
• Rapid Razors: Razor Rotors pop Bloons faster.
  • Pops 25% times faster than normal.
• Charged Chinooks: Chinook Activated Abilities give 25% more lives and cash.
  • Allows the Support Chinook to drop $2,250 and 12 lives. Also affects Special Poperations as well, producing $5,625 and 31 lives.
• Military Conscription: First military tower costs only ⅔ of the original cost.
  • Heli Pilot base cost from $1,360, $1,600, $1,730, and $1,920 → $910, $1,070, $1,160, and $1,285 on Easy, Medium, Hard, and Impoppable, respectively.
• Advanced Logistics: All Military Monkeys base costs reduced by 5%.
  • Heli Pilot base cost from $1,360, $1,600, $1,730, and $1,920 → $1,290, $1,520, $1,640, and $1,825 on Easy, Medium, Hard, and Impoppable, respectively.
    • If Military Conscription is also enabled, the final cost will be $845, $990, $1,070, and $1,190.
• Door Gunner: Enables Door Gunner special ability.
• Monkey Education: All Monkeys XP earn rate increased by 8%.
• Better Sell Deals: All Monkeys sell for 5% more.
  • Increases sell potency from 70% to 75%.
• Veteran Monkey Training: All Monkeys reload time reduced by 3%.
• Global Ability Cooldowns: All Ability cooldowns for all Monkeys reduced by 3%.

Version History

Differences Between BTD5 and BTD6

Listed are comparisons of the Heli Pilot in BTD6 compared to BTD5. Takes into account Mobile versions.

• Heli Pilots no longer clash with Monkey Aces.
• All abilities of Support Chinook (along with the new 5th-tier upgrade Special Poperations) have an initial cooldown.

Balance Changes

Initial release (compared to BTD5)

Note: Lists all balance changes implemented for the Heli Pilot when it was first released in Bloons TD 6 (June 14th 2018) in comparison to Bloons TD 5. Takes into account Mobile versions of Bloons TD 5.

• Heli Pilots no longer clash with Monkey Aces.
• All abilities of Support Chinook (along with the new 5th-tier upgrade Special Poperations) have an initial cooldown.

2.0

• Apache Prime now moves faster.
• Duplicated towers glitch from Support Chinook's Tower-Moving Ability will no longer work.

3.0

• Can be no longer placed on Carrier Flagship, along with Banana Farms and Monkey Aces.
• Mini-helicopters of the Comanche Defense upgrade can now be affected by Radar Scanner benefits.
• Comanche Defense always calls in three mini-helicopters in all cases.

4.0

• Instamonkey Heli Pilots will automatically go on Pursuit upon placement.
• Apache Dartship cost decreased ($20,000 → $15,000).
• Apache Prime now has much more pierce.

6.0

• Apache Prime does +1 damage and +1 pierce to its main plasma attack.
• Comanche Defense's and Comanche Commander's mini-helicopters will no longer gain double bonus stats (attack speed, damage, range, etc.) from Alchemists or Gwen or other stat-bonus grants.

7.0

• x-5-x Special Poperations Monkey Marine cooldown reduced 50s → 40s.
• x-x-4 Comanche Defense cooldown reduced 45s → 25s.

8.0

• Apache Dartship price increased ($15,000 → $19,500).
• Apache Dartship rocket damage increased (1 → 2).
• Apache Dartship machine gun fire rate increased by 25%.
• Apache Prime machine gun damage increased (3 → 5).
• Apache Prime rocket damage to MOAB-class increased (11 → 16).
• Comanche Commander mini-helicopters will now use up Alchemist brews.

9.0

• Apache Dartship price increased from $19,500 to $19,600.

11.0

• Lock in Place and Patrol Points will no longer immediately ask player to pick locations. Swapping out those target modes will remember the last targetting until changed again.

15.0

• x-x-4 Comanche Defense maximum activations per round increased (1 → 2) (Still has an internal cooldown of 25 sec).

17.0

• Heli Pilot base cost increased ($1,500 → $1,600).

18.0

• x-x-4 Comanche Defense will now instead spawn 1 Comanche the first time any Bloon crosses 25% of the track each round.
• x-x-4 Will also spawn 2 additional Comanche at 50% of the track. If the first Comanche is still on screen it's duration will be refreshed and only 1 extra will spawn.
• x-x-4 Will also spawn 3 additional Comanche at 75% of the track. If the 2nd set of Comanche are still on screen their duration will be refreshed and only 1 extra will spawn.
• Comanche will now spawn from the side of the map closest to where the triggering Bloon is located.
• Comanche spawn movespeed now increased to always be 30 more than the speed of the main Comanche Defense tower (45 + 30 for 75).
• 0-2-4 Comanche Defense will also apply increased flight speed to spawned Comanche.
• x-x-5 Mini Comanche will load in under the main Commander when loading a save instead of at the edge of the screen.
• The tiers for the x-x-1 Faster Darts and x-x-2 Faster Firing upgrades have been swapped.

19.0

• Comanche Defense price reduced ($10,000 → $8,500).

20.0

“	Pursuit Downdraft has felt like an overperformer for a very long time, but instead of outright nerfing it we increased crosspath potential for those who manually take control over their heli micro. On the opposite end of the spectrum, Pursuit Razor Rotors has underperformed due to distancing itself far too much, so we increased the range of this attack slightly.	”
	~ Ninja Kiwi

• 3-0-0 Razor Rotors area increased from 33 to 35.
• 0-3-0 blow rate reduced from 0.125 → 0.15.
• 0-3-2 blow rate increased from 0.125 → 0.12.
• x-x-4 Comanche Defense duration increased 10s → 12s.

21.0

“	Heli Pilot manages on pursuit far too easily without any need to consider Bigger Jets unless camo or downdraft is required. For more crosspath variety than just 'camo' we moved more of the base Heli speed out and back into Bigger Jets with an overall buff to Bigger Jets. This should allow Bigger Jets to scale a little better than other helis through early speed ramping. Due to overall comparisons between Downdraft's blowback & MOAB Shove we have also slashed MOAB Shove's price by 30% to give it & Comanche more of a kickstart.	”
	~ Ninja Kiwi

• Heli base speed reduced from 45 → 40.
• x-1-x Bigger Jets speed increased from 67.5 to 70.
• x-x-3 Heli MOAB Shove price reduced from $5,000 → $3,500.

22.0

“	A little more buffing of underused crosspath.	”
	~ Ninja Kiwi

• 0-1-3 MOAB Shove now pushes blimps further.
  • MOAB speed: -0.33 → -0.44.
  • BFB speed: 0 → -0.11.
  • ZOMG speed: 0.33 → 0.22.

23.0

“	Further small buff to Comanche as prior balancing has not felt sufficient.	”
	~ Ninja Kiwi

• Comanche Defense reinforcements duration increased (12s → 15s).

24.0

“	Razor Rotors doesn't synergize well with it's own T2 and is kinda the dunce of T3 Helis.	”
	~ Ninja Kiwi

• Razor Rotors blade damage increased (1 → 2).

25.0

• [undocumented] Apache Prime's laser attack now is energy type instead of normal type.
• [undocumented, likely a bug] Apache Prime's plasma machine gun attack now is energy type instead of plasma type.

26.0

“	We've noted that Special Poperations has save-up issues, and then once owned has uptime and single target issues. With the 30 second duration, it now has potentially no downtime and instead allowing careful (or techbot) management to give a short burst of increased single target.	”
	~ Ninja Kiwi

• Special Poperations, Marine ability cooldown reduced from 40s to 25s.
• Special Poperations, Marine unit pierce reduced from 30 to 20.

28.0

“	For similar reasons to Sniper, Chinook is a pretty annoying tower to farm with, so its ability has been standardized into a single producing both a life & a cash crate on a longer cooldown; the cash production of this has gone up while the life generation has been reduced as the power stood out too much compared to any other life generation method. MOAB Shove has had a missile attack similar to xx4's mini comanches added to provide this path something extra for when the mini comanche are not active.	”
	~ Ninja Kiwi

• Support Chinook's Cash Generating abilities now have a 3 minute timeout
• Support Chinook's Supply Drop now drops life and cash crates together
• Support Chinook's Supply Drop cooldown increased from 60s -> 90s
• Support Chinook's Supply Drop cash is now changed from $1000-$2000 to a fixed $1800 value
• Support Chinook's Supply Drop lives produced decreased from 50-75 lives to 10 lives
• Special Poperations Supply Drop cash is now changed from $2000-$4000 to a fixed $4500
• Special Poperations Supply Drop lives produced decreased from 100-150 lives to 25 lives
• MOAB Shove gains a 'mini heli missile' attack with pierce 10 damage 1, and +2 damage to Ceramics and above
• Comanche Defense increases 'mini heli missile' pierce to 30
• Comanche Defense increases 'mini heli missile' damage to 3, on top of +2 damage to Ceramics and above

30.0

“	Comanche Defense mostly suffered during downtime and so the base Heli at T4 has had some general improvements made to power, but the mini helis have also gained a pierce increase to provide the darts with some improved crowd control	”
	~ Ninja Kiwi

• Comanche Defense main heli missile attack cooldown decreased 3s -> 1s
• Comanche Defense main heli dart damage increased 1 -> 2
• Comanche Defense mini heli pierce increased 3 -> 4
• Comanche Commander main heli dart damage increased 2 -> 3

31.0

“	Previously Razor Rotor’s used to make the heli pursue for a further distance & this caused it to often fail to reach Lead Bloons with the rotor attack that could pop them. This overall seemed like a design flaw so that back-off distance has been moved up to the T4 instead. Apache Dartship has also fallen off over time as a viable saveup for prime, though it is meant to be reasonably difficult some changes have made this a little more difficult than it probably should be so we have increased the pierce of the machinegun attack.	”
	~ Ninja Kiwi

• 3xx Razor Rotor’s pursuit no longer backs so far away from Leads that it can’t hit them, Does not affect subsequent upgrades
• 4xx Apache Dartship Machinegun pierce increased 5 -> 7, Apache Prime's pierce remains the same

32.0

“	Heli’s blowback has always been extremely effective from early on, and as players have become more knowledgeable the use into lategame as well only seems to go up especially moving into Super Ceramics. This change shouldn’t really have as large an impact at higher level gameplay as total map length is so much shorter you will often still be blowing back the entire track, but the blowback range has been reduced at T3 leading back into the old value at T4	”
	~ Ninja Kiwi

• Downdraft blowback distance reduced from 32-300 to 32-150, Support Chinook blowback distance remains unchange

33.0

“	Heli’s Razor Rotors don’t scale with higher tiers so improvements have been made specifically to that attack for Dartship & Apache Prime. Support Chinook use is too niche outside of farming for the high cost, so the upgrade cost along with that effective cash gain amount from ability usage has been lowered to retain the same farming while improving niche use. Downdraft has more general use throughout the game and scales better than the more expensive MOAB Shove upgrade though they both see use, so the price of these upgrades has been swapped around. Faster Darts xx1 upgrade will now increase the attack distance of Heli Dart attacks in order to assist with cluttering issues where large numbers of Helis will push each other away from nearby targets.	”
	~ Ninja Kiwi

• Apache Dartship rotors damage increased 2 -> 4
• Apache Dartship rotors pierce increased 10 -> 20
• Apache Prime rotors damage increased 2 -> 8
• Apache Prime rotors pierce increased 10 -> 40
• Support Chinook price reduced $12,000 -> $10,500
• Support Chinook crate cash reduced $1800 -> $1650
• Downdraft price increased $3000 -> $3500
• MOAB Shove price reduced $3500 -> $3000
• Faster Darts also increases attack distance of dart attacks by +30%

35.0

“	ComCom is both lacking in pierce damage, and favors the 105 crosspath more than we’d like. This goal for this change is to improve the overall single target power for the missile AoE without such a high pierce number, with only a smaller damage buff for the main darts so existing pierce benefits that can be applied for the main attack remain valuable	”
	~ Ninja Kiwi

• Comanche Defense missile pierce reduced 100 -> 80
• Comanche Commander dart damage 3 -> 4
• Comanche Commander missile damage 3 -> 7
• Comanche Commander missile moab bonus 2 -> 5
• Comanche Commander mini's missile dmg 2 -> 5
• Comanche Commander mini's missile moab bonus 2 -> 5

36.0

“	For how powerful downdraft is in comparison to other blowback effects, it didn’t feel right that it wasn’t blowing off status effects as should be normal there. Redeploy feels like it has no business having so long a cooldown, maybe it could see more realistic use cases for this main mechanic if it was able to be utilized more frequently.	”
	~ Ninja Kiwi

• Downdraft's blowback now removes glue and ice status effects with blowback
  • In terms of nerfs, it makes late-game stalling harder to perform in combination with Ice, since Downdraft removes important benefits from the glue/ice status effects, as well as allowing Downdraft to more easily damage bloons.
  • In terms of buffs, it is now easier to forcefully reposition bloons and remove ice/glue properties at will.
• Support Chinook redeploy ability cooldown reduced 60s → 45s

37.0

“	Even with the map-range advantage, rotors are weak compared to any other constant AoE circle like this. Chinook feels like it’s near a place we are happy with now, however we want another tiny nudge on cost while keeping cash generation value the same. Pushing some higher values on the last Comanche Commander changes as the missile attack is effectively such a small portion of the tower’s total damage late game.	”
	~ Ninja Kiwi

• 3-0-2 Razor Rotors rotor attack will now gain 0.80x attack cooldown from the Faster Firing crosspath
• Razor Rotors rotor attack cooldown rate reduced 0.75s → 0.5s
• Support Chinook price reduced $10500 → $9500
• Support Chinook supply crate cash generated reduced $1,650 → $1,550, does not affect to Special Poperations
• Support Chinook max uses per round reduced 3 → 2
• Comanche Defense and Comanche Commander's mini Comanches now follow the target priority on Main Comanche instead of always Pursuit
• Comanche Commander main missile damage increased 7 → 15
• Comanche Commander main missile MOAB-class damage bonus increased +5 → +8
• Comanche Commander mini's missile damage increased 5 → 15
• Comanche Commander mini's missile MOAB-class damage bonus increased +5 → +8

38.0

“	Given Downdraft has competed as one of the most debated best towers in the game basically for its entire life for both early and late game we are reducing some of the extreme effectiveness against late game Super Ceramics by reworking it to have an overall increased effect of blowing back multiple smaller children at a time but now requiring 2 pierce to blow back ceramics. At the same time, the T4 Support Chinook is also having a large increase to make it now a more powerful real end-game choice for a lategame version of Downdraft that can quickly deal with large groups of Super Ceramics.	”
	~ Ninja Kiwi

• Downdraft rate 0.15 > 0.225
• x3x Downdraft pierce 1 > 2
• x3x Downdraft ceramic pierce penalty 0 > 1
• x4x Support Chinook downdraft pierce 1 > 4
• x4x Support Chinook downdraft rate remains 0.15
• x4x Support Chinook downdraft no longer increases blowback distance
• Support Chinook description changed from "Abilities: Drops lives and cash crates, or can pick up and redeploy most Monkey types." to "Blows back many more Bloons and gains abilities: Drops lives and cash crates, and can pick up and redeploy most Monkey types."

39.0

“	Support Chinook struggles to do anything with its main attack due to the projectile spawn offset changing at this tier, so we’re slightly tweaking the main attack to assist it here. While the state of Comanche Defense has come a good way, xx5 still feels too expensive for what it offers.	”
	~ Ninja Kiwi

• Support Chinook projectile size increased (3 → 6)
• Support Chinook damage increased (1 → 2)
  • Note: Support Chinook is a supporting tower with a cooldown-based income generation, so this damage buff is a nerf to stalling.
• Comanche Commander price reduced ($35,000 → $32,000)

41.0

“	Pursuit will now interact with Patrol Points in a limited 'pursuit between points', with this now you will be able to make your pursuit heli stay on one side on multi-path maps without getting stuck in the middle. Razor Rotors is fairly good now, but it could still justify a little more power given the weaknesses of the expensive upgrades that it builds into.	”
	~ Ninja Kiwi

• Pursuit upgrades the Patrol Points flight pattern to a 'Pursue Between Points'
• 3-0-x Razor Rotors rotors attack cooldown reduced from 0.5s to 0.45s
• 3-0-2 Razor Rotors rotors attack cooldown reduced from 0.4s to 0.36s.

42.0

“	The blowback rate of Special Poperations is being increased to reflect the previous changes upgrading downdraft to support chinook and bring up more lategame value in the support capabilities of this path. Comanche Commander’s value soared recently with buffs along with the recent Geraldo subtowers bugfix which solidified it as a strong lategame dps, and given the powerful synergies right now the current price feels far too low for what is now a solid pick for any map; we feel this may not be enough of a nerf but wish to hold off until v43 for further changes to be considered with this synergy.	”
	~ Ninja Kiwi

• Special Poperations downdraft attack cooldown reduced from 0.15s to 0.075s
• Comanche Commander price increased from $32,000 to $35,000

43.0

“	Overall Comanche cleanup and stats shuffle; with the goal of improving baseline non-buffed performance and making it less demanding of Geraldo’s Pickle for high damage.	”
	~ Ninja Kiwi

• Special Poperations Marine can now be sold in CHIMPS
• Comanche Defense mini's attack cooldown increased from 0.151848s to 0.228s. Also affects Comanche Commander.
• Comanche Commander mini heli dart damage increased from 2 to 3
• Comanche Defense mini's missile damage from 1 to 4. Does not affect Comanche Commander (15).
• Comanche Defense mini's missile pierce from 80 to 60. Also affects Comanche Commander.
• Comanche Defense mini's missile ceramic bonus not changed from +1 to +2, because the original ceramic bonus is +2. (Ninja Kiwi wrongly stating that it is +1)
• Comanche Defense mini's missile no longer gains +2 MOAB-class damage
• Comanche Commander mini's missile ceramic bonus increased from +2 to +10
• Comanche Commander mini's missile no longer gains +8 MOAB-class damage

44.0

“	Players have noticed the life crate has more collection radius than the cash crate, and that this causes problems for some strategies / challenges as you don’t always want to increase lives, so these radius have been matched. Special Poperations struggles to fit into competitive strategies due to it serving a different purpose than the T4, so the cooldown of the Support Chinook ability at T5 is now being greatly reduced in order to continue building on what is good about the T4 even for strategies that may not need the Marine specifically.	”
	~ Ninja Kiwi

• Support Chinook lives crate collection radius reduced from 100 to 50
• Special Poperations' Redeploy ability cooldown reduced from 45s to 15s
• [undocumented] Special Poperations' Redeploy ability initial cooldown reduced from 15s to 0s

Bug Fixes and General Changes

8.1

• Comanche Defense and Comanche Commander no longer gain double benefits from Permabrew (similar to 6.0 Heli-Alch nerf, but applies to Permabrew too now).

9.0

• Support Chinook should no longer revert placement settings after being canceled.

10.0

• Marine is now placed correctly more consistently.

11.0

• x-4-x Resolved a crash with support chinook redeploy.

12.0

• x-5-x Redeploy crash issue with arctic wind has been resolved.
• Redeploy can no longer move Sun Temples in some cases.
• It is no longer possible to stack towers on top of the Carrier Flagship via the sell-rebuy Flagship exploit.
• It is no longer possible to place "floating" land towers on water via selling Arctic Wind while Chinook picks up the land tower that would land towards the Arctic Wind platform.

14.0

• x-x-4 Heli's Comanche now correctly gain camo detection from Monkey Villages.

18.0

• x-4-x Towers in-transit from one location to another will no longer be sold when a platform that was supporting them is moved or destroyed.
• Redeploy no longer can used to stack towers on top of other existing towers.
• x-4-x Selling a Support Chinook will no longer occasional randomly sell other towers.
• x-4-x Support Chinook will no longer crash the game attempting to redeploy an Arctic Wind monkey onto its own frozen platform.

19.0

• Heli will no longer lock rotation sometimes when locked in place.

20.0

• Should no longer cause a crash on Geared when map is turning.
• Resolved a crash related to 2 chinook helis targeting the same tower.
• Co-op no longer allows towers to be upgraded while redeploying.

21.0

• x-3-x Downdraft Blowback effects can no longer push Bloons out of bounds.
• x-5-x Resolved an issue with Door Gunner allowing deployment on invalid terrain.

22.0

• x-4-x Support Chinook now records Cash Earned separately from pops.

24.0

• x-x-1 Faster Firing description has been updated with more detail.
• x-x-3 MOAB Shove description has been updated with more detail.

26.0

• x-0-4 Comanche Defense should now correctly be able to spawn Mini-Comanche if it is granted camo detection from an external source.
• Comanche Defense should no longer be completely and utterly bonk on Workshop.
• Special Poperations will no longer crash the game if disabling MK after picking up a door gunner.

28.1

• Resolved a crash when setting Heli patrol points to a distance so small it was dividing by zero.

38.0

• Door gunner can no longer collect towers from the Polyphemus Eye as it closes

Sounds

When placing a Heli Pilot:

• [Spinning rotors]
• [Spinning rotors]

When activating Supply Crate Ability:

• [Crate dropping]
• [Cash collecting]
• [Lives collecting]

When activating Redeploy Ability:

• [Helicopter flying]
• [Picking up towers]
• [Dropping off towers]

When activating Marine Ability:

• [Helicopter flying]

Gallery

Follow Touch target priority in BTD6 Mobile

Follow Mouse target priority in BTD6 Steam

Entire Heli Pilot Upgrade Tree for Bloons TD 6

The base Heli Pilot pad, alongside all Tier 4 and Tier 5 pads.

Heli Pilot ready to unlock

Official artwork

Tower portrait

Instamonkey icon

In 'Ace and Heli' Steam Profile background

Trivia

• This tower has one of the 6 upgrade paths (specifically path 3) that are made entirely of upgrades that weren't in Bloons TD 5, not counting the Druid and Alchemist which are completely new towers. The other 5 paths are: path 3 of the Ice Monkey, path 1 of the Wizard Monkey, path 3 of the Super Monkey, path 3 of the Banana Farm and path 3 for the Spike Factory.
  • 5 of these 6 are third paths, but it should not be surprising, considering that, excluding the cases where the new upgrades are evenly distributed among the three paths, path 3 introduces Tier 3 and above upgrades that are new to this game.
• Unlike Sniper Monkey, Mortar Monkey or Monkey Ace, Heli Pilot can get the range buff bonus to increase the actual attack range of helicopters.
• All of the upgrade paths are based upon real life helicopters, with the first path based on the AH-64 Apache, the second based on the CH-47 Chinook, and the third based on the RAH-66 Comanche.